Kempe Foundation to benefit from Short Story and Poetry Collection from TL;DR Press

Posted on October 22, 2018

TL;DR Press has opened a call for submissions to create a family-themed short story and poetry collection for The Kempe Foundation to release during the holiday season for their Winter Quarterly.

The call is open to any genre of fiction short story or poetry with a maximum entry of 3,000 words and one story per submission. Submissions must have family – whether by blood or bond – as a central theme. All profits from the sale of the Winter Quarterly will go directly to The Kempe Foundation.

“We have high expectations, given the submission quality of our past collections, of what our writing community has in store for this Quarterly,” says Sarah Linders, one of the 10 co-founders of TL;DR Press. “Partnering with a charity as impactful as The Kempe Foundation has all of us very excited. We work closely with the charities that we partner with, and finding a good match is key to a great collection.”

The Kempe Foundation has worked for 45 years to prevent and treat abused and neglected children. They work to keep all children safe and healthy by supporting experts in the field who are developing and delivering cutting-edge programs proven to reduce the incidences of child maltreatment. They advocate for policies and increased funding for programs that protect children from abuse and neglect. They also partner with human service agencies and other nonprofit organizations to raise awareness of the factors that contribute to child abuse and neglect. The Kempe Foundation is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization based out of Denver, Colorado.

“Allfamilies have stories to tell, regardless of their culture or their circumstances,” says Julia Stone, president and chief operating officer for The Kempe Foundation. “We look forward to being a part of this collection of family stories that will bring others strength, hope and inspiration.”

All writers who submit to the collection can have their work reviewed and edited by a member of the Winter Quarterly editorial team, with time to edit and re-submit before a decision is made on their acceptance into the collection. This support is made possible thanks to the dual mission of TL;DR Press, a volunteer-run, for-charity publisher of short story and poetry collections, to support charity and emerging writers.

“We’re the only volunteer press giving every writer who submits to us detailed feedback,” says Linders. “Feedback is one of the hardest things for new and emerging writers to receive. We give back to the writers through mentorship and editing expertise, shaping submissions into the best they can be. This approach is a win for the submitting writers, for us as a publisher, and for the charity because it creates great work.”

The Press has already published two charity-funding anthologies since its inception in February of 2018: TL;DR: A Redditwriters Mixtape Vol. 1 in March 2018 to benefit Doctors Without Borders and the Women’s Anthology: Carrying Fire in October 2018 to benefit the Endometriosis Foundation of America.

“We have a fantastic team of writers from across countries, genres, and skillsets. We are powered by a community of almost 100 writers, who we run contests, host workshops, and facilitate discussion for. Our community, in turn, submits to and volunteers their time and talents for our collections,” says Linders. “TL;DR Press and the ‘#tldrwriters’ have created something special, fueled by charity, and we show no signs of slowing down.”

The call for submissions closes November 11, 2018, and submission guidelines are available on the Press’ website.